


What May Have Been

by FanficsbyVe



Category: Friday the 13th Series (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-31
Updated: 2016-12-31
Packaged: 2018-09-13 16:50:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9132886
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FanficsbyVe/pseuds/FanficsbyVe
Summary: How would Jason's life have turned out without his terrible beginnings? One-shot.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I'm a casual slasher movie fan, but of all the villains in this genre, Jason was the only one I felt sort-of sorry for. Unlike Michael Myers or Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees didn't necessarily have to turn out the way he did. So, while it's probably kind of unorthodox, I ended up writing this.  
> From what I've noticed, the Friday the 13th franchise is not really big on continuity, so I mostly went with info provided by Kane Hodder (who played Jason the longest), Ken Kirzinger, the first and second movie and medical info on mentally challenged people in terms of trying to define Jason's personality.

Camp Crystal Lake was quiet this time of night. It usually was. The town was sleepy, especially at night time. All, except for the screams. 

The girl screamed as she tripped on a branch. He had advanced, quite rapidly and pulled her off the ground by her throat. Even though his fingers were tightening around her windpipe, she tried to beg. Whimper insipidly for her life.

Her friends, the few that were left, were somewhere in these woods too. They were probably hiding, perhaps even mere feet away. They might even be watching him, too scared to anything. Not that they could anyway. No one could stop him.

He’d killed a few of them already. Stabbed them through the chest. Drowned them in the lake. Pulled them right through the walls of the cabins were they thought they were safe. That or he simply choked the life out of them. He didn’t even understand why and he didn’t need to. All he knew was that a voice told him to do it. 

He’d get them. All of them. None of them would leave the camp once they’d enter it. He’d make sure of that. He’d make them all pay for what they did. But first, this one. 

He threw her on the ground like a ragdoll. He swore he could hear some of her bones snap from the force alone, but her sobbing meant nothing to him. He raised the machete above his head and in one smooth swing, brought it down on her. 

Instantly, her skull was cleft in two and he could see blood spurting out, her brain, still pulsing, perfectly visible. A gurgle left her mouth, slurring the last plea for mercy she likely wanted to say and her orifices were starting to leak crimson as well. He simply wrested the weapon from her skull, only to bring it down again and this time easily sever her head from her neck. 

He simply looked at the corpse, going through its final convulsions before lying motionless. He could feel the warm drops of blood on his clothes and shook the remaining droplets from his machete. He stood there, as if in thought for a moment, before hearing something.

“That’s my boy. Hunt them down and make them pay. That’s my boy. That’s my beautiful, special boy...”

That voice… He had no idea who it was and when he looked around, he couldn’t find anyone either. It seemed to come from the depths of his own head and he wondered just why it got there. 

He reached up to his face, only to feel something hard and unyielding strapped to it. A mask, a hockey mask he figured. Confusion hit him. Why did he even have a mask on his head? And why had he just killed all these people in the first place?

He looked back at the body and suddenly, he felt sick. Had he actually done that? Hurt someone that badly? Why? Why had he done that? And why had the voice encouraged him to?

The machete slipped from his hand and he started clawing at thing on his head. It didn’t budge and the smell on blood only made him even more frightened. The voice inside him seemed to get angry with him, telling him to keep on going, to keep killing whoever was left in the camp. 

“Make mother proud, Jason!”

By now, he was swiftly panicking. What was going on? Why was he killing people? He never wanted to. His mother would never ask him to do that. And he’d never even been in Camp Crystal Lake…

Suddenly, a feeling of absolute horror came over him and he screamed. This wasn’t right… This wasn’t right at all…

A sound between a gasp and a scream reverberated through the house as a tall man shot up from his bed. His blurry eyes darted across the room, hands clutching at the sheets. He looked around a few times, feeling like he was going to vomit, desperately trying to shake off the remains of sleep, before slowly coming to his senses and calming down.

It had all just been a bad dream.

It was only mere minutes after this that the alarm clock went off beside his bed. The sharp ringing noise hurt his ears and he slammed the button to shut it off. He then quickly got up, cleaned himself up and got dressed. By now, the nausea and fear had somewhat worn off and he felt a little bit better again.

When done, he quickly headed to the main hall. Breakfast in Crystal Cove Residences was always served at the same time and while he was capable of cooking his own food if he had to, he preferred the meals the facility provided. He wondered what he was going to have today.

Initially, his parents weren’t too keen on him wanting to leave the nest. They were worried for his safety. Still, he’d insisted that he wanted to be able to have the same life as Alice and eventually, they’d help him move into this assisted living facility, where he could pretty much do what he wanted but had people looking out for him. He didn’t mind. He quite enjoyed living here.

He quickly sought out the nearest empty chair and sat down on it, picking up the cutlery and impatiently staring at the empty plate. He didn’t mind at all when another chair at the table was occupied by another resident. He smiled a crooked smile at Clara, another longtime tenant with whom he often spent his free time. His sister had explained she had something called Down’s Syndrome and that her mind was sometimes a bit slower, just like his. 

He figured he understood, but in the end, it didn’t matter much to him. Clara was always kind and pleasant to him. What’s more, like him, she didn’t like to talk much either. They could be quiet together and that was something he really appreciated.

“Good morning, Clara. And good morning, Jason.”

The sound of the staff member had him look up. He smiled upon seeing Brenda, one of his favorite nurses, approach the table with food. He gave her a friendly nod as she stacked his and Clara’s plates with today’s breakfast, bacon, eggs and toast, and once she walked off and he said grace, he happily tucked in. 

Some would say Jason Hardy was born unlucky. Apart from being born on Friday the 13th, he was born deformed, with a severe case of hydrocephalus and limited mental faculties as a result of the latter. His birth parents, a raging abusive alcoholic and a mentally unstable teen mother, had been so dysfunctional that social services had swiftly taken him away and placed him in foster care. His childhood had been a mix of surgery to place and replace shunts in his head to drain the fluids, the occasional bullying and an initial response of disgust and fear when meeting someone new. If he got a nickel for every time he heard someone say they pitied him when they thought he didn’t hear it, he probably would have been rich by now. 

Honestly, he didn’t understand why people were saying that. His adoptive parents and sister Alice had always been very loving and protective of him. He went to a special school where he’d learned lots of interesting things. Whenever he was bullied, there was always a teacher or fellow student to stand up for him. Thanks to all the surgeries, he felt little to no pain in his head anymore and his face could have been a lot worse. Also, he lived in a nice place with nice people, doing stuff he enjoyed. If anything, he figured, shouldn’t that make him lucky instead?

After eating his meal and saying bye to Clara, he got up to leave the facility and head to work. For several years now, he worked at Lake’s Goods, a small mom and pop general store on the main street of town. It was run by an older man named Ralph and his wife Betty, whom had hired him to do chores around the building. He was the one in charge of stocking the store, cleaning it, picking up and delivering goods or making repairs when anything was broken. 

Especially that last one, he really enjoyed. In spite of being a little slower than most people, Jason had always been really good with tools. Be it a hammer, screwdriver, axe or even a machete, once someone showed him what could be done with them in terms of building or repairing something, it never left his mind. Encouraged by those around him, he’d set to learning as much as his mind allowed him and experimenting did the rest. It had made him quite the versatile handyman and popular in the neighborhood when they needed a quick solution to a technical problem. 

All in all, it was probably why he was so content working here. Ralph and Betty were nice people who looked after him. Most customers and people in the area knew him and weren’t afraid of him. Work in the store required him to keep busy but wasn’t too hectic most of the time and, even better, people were allowed to bring pets inside since the owner had a dog as well. He really liked that last one; animals were good to him regardless of how he looked and it was a reason why he often volunteered in the local pet shelter on weekends. 

He waved at Betty as he walked into the store, then quickly got into the backroom to change into his apron. He petted old Biscuit as he lay sleeping on the rug, then shoved the piece of cloth over his own chest. As he did, he quietly listened to the nearby radio as it played some old tunes before switching to the news. 

“This afternoon, there has been a fire on 42 Cars Crash Road. Firefighters managed to extinguish the blaze and found a burnt body inside. They suspect it belongs to resident Pamela Voorhees. Authorities are not yet certain if foul play was involved.”

He froze halfway through his movements as the news announcer spoke, his heart skipping a small beat. He knew that name. It probably said more to him than to most people in Crystal Lake, though not by much. 

Jason didn’t really remember much of his biological mother. He knew that her name was Pamela Voorhees and that his father left her and went missing. His adopted parents had been very open with him about where he came from and done their best to explain it in a way he could understand when he had the age for it. They had never badmouthed her and even offered him to get in contact with her, but he had somehow never really wanted to, though he couldn’t explain why.

He’d only ever met her once. He couldn’t recall how old he was exactly, but he thought it was when he was a teenager. She had managed to find out which school he had gone to and was waiting for him. She’d grabbed hold of him, painfully so, and told him to come back home with her. That evil people had taken him away and she wouldn’t let anyone keep them apart again. How much she missed him and how he was her special boy. 

He didn’t even remember everything she said. All he remembered was that something about this woman wasn’t…right. Something about the way she acted just felt wrong. It brought back something vague but horrible in his head, like how when he was a little younger, he was sure there were monsters hiding under his bed. It had frightened him. 

When her rambling got more frantic and her grip on him only got tighter, it had been the breaking point. He’d panicked and shoved her off him. Already large and burly for someone his age, the force had flung her against the ground, but he had been too scared to worry about maybe having hurt her. He simply ran back into the school and had stayed there until his adopted parents, alerted by a worried teacher, came to pick him up and calmed him down.

What happened after, he wasn’t sure. According to Alice, the teacher had also called the cops and his mother had been arrested. That they had given her something that meant she couldn’t show up at his school or house or anywhere near him anymore. She told him she was sorry for what happened, but he was honestly more relieved than upset that he would never see this person again. 

So she was likely dead now… Somewhere, he wondered why he didn’t feel that sad. Shouldn’t you feel sad when your mother died? Even if he’d never really known her? Even if the one time he’d met her still caused a shiver to run across his spine when he thought about it?

Suddenly, the nightmare was on his mind again. About Camp Crystal Lake. About him killing people in the hockey mask. The voice in his head who told him “mother was proud”. He usually didn’t think about much, but at that moment, he couldn’t help but wonder.

Was what he dreamed something that could have happened?

The thought alone made him sick to his stomach, so much so that he brushed it off immediately. He didn’t want to worry about it. He’d think about it later. Call Alice and tell her what happened. He was sure she could help him make sense of all of it. 

He quickly put on his apron and rushed back to the front of the store, reporting for work. His employer gave him a list of all the stuff that had come in and what needed to be stored and put on display. He happily went about his assigned task, quickly filling all the shelves and getting rid of any product that was expired. When that was done, he set about checking if everything worked and helping out the many customers, playing with Biscuit when there was nothing else to do.

It was early in the afternoon, during lunchbreak with his employers, that he heard the bell on the door ring again. Gesturing for the two older people to remain seated, he headed back to the front of the store to look after the customers. That was, until he saw who it was and quietly let out a small sigh. 

A bunch of teenagers, a bit on the older side, and, judging by what they were wearing, likely counselors of nearby Camp Crystal Lake.

He’d been never been to the camp himself, instead going to one for children such as him during summers. According to Alice, however, he hadn’t missed much. While the camp and the activities were nice, the counselors weren’t the most responsible people in the world. In fact, he was pretty certain he’d seen at least one court case about accidents caused by neglect there, either on TV or heard it on the radio.

They also didn’t always act properly. While some of the older ones knew him, Ralph and Betty and were friendly to them, newer ones were often incredibly rude and made a mess of the store. Sometimes, they just even seemed plain…out of it, for lack of a better word. They would often smell then too, one scent he recognized as alcohol and another that had a strange burnt quality to it. It unsettled him. He wasn’t very smart, but if these people were looking after children, he was worried. 

Still, knowing he was expected to be nice to all customers, he approached. He took up a spot behind the counter, where he knew he would be visible. If they needed his help for anything, they only had to holler. And soon one did, for all the wrong reasons.

“Whoa, look at the mug on that guy!”

Jason cringed as one of them practically shouted that statement and he tried his best not to glare. He wasn’t really bothered by the fact that people were put off by his appearance; it was the usual reaction when they first met him. Still, they didn’t have to be so mean about it. 

Just as he thought that, however, the rude counselor received a rough shove from another one of the group, hissing under her breath. “Don’t be rude, Chad! He’s the guy Kenny told us about. The strong, retarded one. Look at how big he is. He could squash us like a bug!”

The guy didn't get the hint. "Wait, so he's big, ugly and stupid? Why worry then, Tif?"

By now, the girl practically punched him. "Oh my God, just shut up! He can still hurt you if he wants!"

In spite of the insult, he failed to suppress a chuckle at that and it was still loud and deep enough that everyone in the store jumped and froze while looking in his direction. He supposed the girl had a point. He’d always been bigger and stronger than most people once he reached his teens and it often kept people from bullying him for fear of what he could do. Never mind that the last time he actually used force on anything was on a stuck door back at Crystal Cove Residences two years ago, but they didn’t have to know that. 

Still, the threat of his nonexistent anger seemingly scared the teenagers into good behavior. He simply waited calmly for them to finish their purchases and bring them to the counter, where he proceeded to counter everything, enter the prices into the register and gave them the total. 

The teens quickly started to gather money, but one of them simply put a single bill on the counter with a grin. “Here, this should be enough.”

He looked down, instantly recognizing it as a five dollar bill that was definitely not enough to cover either a quarter of the costs. He stared at it for a second, then stared back at the girl in question, sending her a tired, annoyed look. This wasn’t the first time someone tried to pull this on him and maybe it was his own limitations, but he could never understand why people thought it would actually work. 

Seriously, what made people think that just because he was mentally challenged, he couldn’t count, write or read? He likely wouldn’t have been able to work here if he didn’t. Even if he couldn’t, he could still distinguish different bills due to the pictures on them. They might call him retarded, but at moments like these, he wondered if people doing this were. 

Apparently, the look on his face said it all, though they clearly took it more as a threat than simply frustration. He could see them shuffle back, looking at him like he was about to cave their skulls in. They then quickly gathered the rest of the money and put it on the counter.

“Alright, alright, I’m sorry! Here’s the rest! It was just a joke! Geez!”

He grinned at their sudden turnaround in behavior, not caring that it probably made him look even worse. He watched them scamper out the door with the wimpiest “bye” he’d ever heard, practically slamming the door behind them. He simply shook his head when they were finally gone, before noticing the air conditioner was humming in a rather unusual way. 

He quickly picked up the toolbox from under the counter to fix it and was still working on it by the time Ralph made his appearance again. The man looked him over, only to be distracted by loud music coming from a car radio and the sound of screeching tires. He made a face and sighed.

“Oh dear, counselors from Camp Crystal Lake?”

Jason nodded and the man gave him a worried glance. “They weren’t bad to you, were they?”

He shook his head, deciding to talk for once. “No. I didn’t like them though.”

Ralph chuckled at that. “Why not?”

He shrugged, as he finished working on the air conditioner and closed the latch with a sigh, wiping strands of messy red hair out of his face. “They think I’m scary.”


End file.
